Great Christmas Scenes… Elf

Everyone gets excited about meeting Santa. But not as much as Will Ferrell does. Smiling is his favourite, after all.

Every year some ‘fun-packed’ Christmas movie is forced on us at the cinema. It usually has a lame premise involving what Santa Claus is really like. It’s usually filled with fake snow as it has been filmed in a blazing hot LA summer. It usually makes you want to justcall off Christmas. Worst of all, it usually stars Vince Vaughn.

But sometimes, in an unlikely development as rare as three wise men turning up at a manger at just the right time, we get something that really is fun. Something that, goddamit, makes you believe in the magic of Christmas all over again. In 1988, that unlikely development was Scrooged. In 1993, it was The Nightmare Before Christmas. And in 2003, it was Elf.

While I am not for one second going to make a case that Elf is the equal of those other two movies, what I will say is this: it is unexpectedly brilliant fun. As the titular Elf, Will Ferrell brilliantly manages to tread the funny tightrope and not fall off into annoying.

Here he engages in some great banter with his new department store boss, played with straight-faced precision by the superbly-monikered Faizon Love. Somehow their childish argument over the whereabouts of the North Pole (‘No it isn’t.’ – ‘Yes it is.’) makes me smile, before a grinning Ferrell gets told to ‘make work his new favourite’. It’s all really simple stuff, but it’s also really sweet. No one does big kid better than Ferrell, and no one could have shouted ‘SANTA!’ louder.

I feel no shame in admitting that this scene makes me laugh my ass off every time I see it. My second-favorite “Elf” scene, however, is far more crass: the one where he glugs a 2-liter Coke and burps for about 20 seconds.